The Rule of Benedict

by Joan Chittister

  Work done in the Benedictine tradition is supposed to be regular, it is supposed to be productive, it is supposed to be worthwhile, but it is not supposed to be impossible. Give help where it is needed, the Rule says. Give whatever it takes to make it possible, the Rule says. Give people whatever they need to do it without grumbling. The servers are to serve, not starve. They are to eat before the others so that they don’t wind up resenting the fact that others are eating and become bitter or reluctant in their service. It is a salutary and sobering thought in an age that exploits the poor and the illiterate with impunity for the sake of the comfort of the rich, paying workers too little to live on and working them too hard to live and then calling it “working your way up” or the “plight” of the unskilled laborer.

  Benedictine spirituality does not set out to burden some for the sake of the others in the name of community. It sets out to make work possible for all so that the community can thrive in joy. Any group, any family, that makes life wonderful for some of its members at the expense of the others, no matter how good the work or how satisfied the group, is not operating in a Benedictine spirituality. It is, at best, simply dealing in some kind of holy exploitation, but it is exploitation nevertheless.

  On Sunday immediately after Lauds, those beginning as well as those completing their week of service should make a profound bow in the oratory before all and ask for their prayers. Let the server completing the week recite this verse: “Blessed are you, O God, who have helped me and comforted me” (Dan. 3:52; Ps. 86:17). After this verse has been said three times the server receives a blessing. Then the one beginning the service follows and says: “O God, come to my assistance; O God, make haste to help me” (Ps. 70:2). And all repeat this verse three times. When they have received a blessing, the servers begin their service.

  In The Sayings of the [Jewish] Fathers it is written, “It is wise to work as well as to study the Torah: between the two you will forget to sin.” To make sure we do not forget that humble work is as sacred and sanctifying as prayer, Benedict blesses the kitchen servers of the week in the middle of the chapel. With that simple but powerful gesture all of life begins to look different for everyone. Suddenly it is not made up of “higher” and “lower” activities anymore. It is all—manual labor and mystical meditation—one straight beam of light on the road to fullness of humanity. One activity without the other, prayer without the creative and compassionate potential of work or work without the transcending quality of prayer, lists heavily to the empty side of life. The blessing prayer for the weekly servers in the midst of the community not only ordains the monastic to serve the community but it also brings together both dimensions of life, the transcendent and the transforming, in one clear arc: prayer is not for its own sake and the world of manual work is not a lesser world than chapel.

  We are all meant both to pray and work, each of them influencing and fulfilling the other.

  CHAPTER 36

  THE SICK

  March 15 – July 15 – Nov. 14

  Care of the sick must rank above and before all else so that they may truly be served as Christ who said: “I was sick and you visited me” (Matt. 25:36) and, “What you did for one of these least of my people you did for me” (Matt. 25:40). Let the sick on their part bear in mind that they are served out of honor for God, and let them not by their excessive demands distress anyone who serves them. Still, the sick must be patiently borne with, because serving them leads to a greater reward. Consequently, the prioress or abbot should be extremely careful that they suffer no neglect.

  The rabbis say, “The purpose of maintaining the body in good health is to make it possible for you to acquire wisdom.” Benedictine spirituality is about coming to a sense of the fullness of life. It is not about being self-destructive or living sour lives or dropping down pits of privacy so deep that no other ever dare intrude. Benedictine spirituality never gives up on life even though death is known to be the entry to its everlasting joy. Why? Because, the rabbi shows us, every day we have gives us another chance to become the real persons we are meant to be. Why? Because, the Scripture says, to serve the sick is to serve the Christ.

  The point for us all, perhaps, is never to give up on life and never to doubt that every bit of kindness, every tender touch we lay upon another in life can heal what might otherwise have died, certainly in them, perhaps even in ourselves.

  Let a separate room be designated for the sick, and let them be served by an attendant who is God-fearing, attentive, and concerned. The sick may take baths whenever it is advisable, but the healthy, and especially the young, should receive permission less readily. Moreover, to regain their strength, the sick who are very weak may eat meat, but when their health improves, they should all abstain from meat as usual.

  The abbot and prioress must take the greatest care that cellarers and those who serve the sick do not neglect them, for the shortcomings of disciples are their responsibility.

  Care for the sick, in the mind of Benedict, is not a simple warehousing process, though that in itself could have been a great contribution to a society without hospitals. Care for the sick, in Benedictine spirituality, is to be done with faith, with attention, and with a care beyond the technical. The infirmarian is to be “concerned.” Baths, a very important part of Roman therapy and hygiene in a hot and sticky climate, and red meat, a treat used only rarely in early monastic houses both because of its scarcity and because of its purported relationship to sexual agitation, are both given generously and recklessly. Care of the sick, you see, is done in the name of God and to the person of the suffering Christ. Nothing was too much. Nothing was to be spared. Nothing that could do good was to be called forbidden.

  We have to ask ourselves, in a society of technological health care, how much of it we do with faith and lavish attention and depth of soul and a love that drives out repulsion. We have to ask ourselves how willing we are to take a little of our own energy on behalf of those who are no longer the life of the party, the help on the job. How much of our own precious time do we spend on those with little time left?

  CHAPTER 37

  THE ELDERLY AND THE YOUNG

  March 16 – July 16 – Nov. 15

  Although human nature itself is inclined to be compassionate toward the elderly and the young, the authority of the rule should also provide for them. Since their lack of strength must always be taken into account, they should certainly not be required to follow the strictness of the rule with regard to food, but should be treated with kindly consideration and allowed to eat before the regular hours.

  There are two ages of life that lack the energy of the prime: youth and old age. Both, Benedict implies, have something to give us provided that we give them something as well. It is a vital lesson. People do not become useless simply because they do not have the strength or stamina of middle age. Life is a series of phases, each of them important, all of them worthwhile. Nothing must ever deter that, not even religious rigor or pious fervor. Fasting is good for the soul, but if it takes too much from the body of the old or the young, it ceases to be an expectation or a virtue. Prayer at the proper hours is good for the spiritual memory of life, but if it taxes the physical energy beyond the bearable, then those times are to be “anticipated,” adjusted, changed for the person rather than destroy the person for the sake of the prayer. Exceptions are the way of life, and when they are not, something is wrong with life itself, Benedict reasons. Benedict builds compassion right into the Rule so that oppression in the name of God will not become a monastic sin. It is a sobering thought, this commitment to moderation and good sense, for people who set out to make the spiritual life central to their own.

  CHAPTER 38

  THE READER FOR THE WEEK

  March 17 – July 17 – Nov. 16

  Reading will always accompany the meals. The reader should not be the one who just happens to pick up the book, but someone who will read for a whole week, beginning on Sunday. After Mass and Communion, let the incoming rea
der ask all to pray so that God may shield them from the spirit of vanity. Let the reader begin this verse in the oratory: “O God, open my lips, and my mouth shall proclaim your praise” (Ps. 51:17), and let all say it three times. When they have received a blessing, they will begin their week of reading.

  Benedictine spirituality was rooted in prayer, study, and work. Every hour of the short days was filled with one or the other, and mealtime, too, was no exception. Monastics used food for energy, not for pleasure. Spiritual nourishment was the food that restored them and impelled them and made them strong, and mealtime was a good time to get it. They rested in body and in spirit there and, even at a moment of physical need, centered their hearts on higher things. They filled their hearts as well as their stomachs.

  Benedict considers reading such an important part of the meal, in fact, that he insists that the person doing the reading be a good reader, someone who would inspire rather than irritate the souls of the listeners. The reading was to be an artistic event, an instructive experience, a moment of meditation, not a wrestling match with words. Nor was it to be a moment of personal display or lordship by those few educated who could read while the rest of the community could not.

  This paragraph is just as important now as the day it was written. Maybe more so. People who give too much attention to the body give too little attention to anything else. They make themselves the idol before which they worship and run the risk of forgetting to raise their minds to higher things because they are more intent on the rich sauces and fine meats and thick desserts that fill their days than to the gaping emptiness in their minds and hearts and souls.

  Let there be complete silence. No whispering, no speaking—only the reader’s voice should be heard there. The members should by turn serve one another’s needs as they eat and drink, so that no one need ask for anything. If, however, anything is required, it should be requested by an audible signal of some kind rather than by speech. No one should presume to ask a question about the reading or about anything else, “lest occasions be given to the devil” (Eph. 4:27; 1 Tim. 5:14). The abbot or prioress, however, may wish to say a few words of instruction.

  In the course of the meal, the monastics are to concentrate on two things: the words of the reading and the needs of their neighbors. It is an astounding demonstration of the nature of the entire Christian life frozen in a single frame. We are to listen intently for the Word of God and be aware of those around us at the same time. Either one without the other is an incomplete Christianity. And never, at any time, are we to concentrate solely on ourselves in the name of religion.

  Because of Communion and because the fast may be too hard for them to bear, the one who is reader for the week is to receive some diluted wine before beginning to read. Afterward they will take their meal with the weekly kitchen servers and the attendants.

  On Sundays and solemn feast days, when the community received Communion, the fast from the night before to the meal that followed the Eucharist was a long one. It would have been even longer for the reader who could eat only after the meal was ended. So Benedict, the one more full of compassion than of law, allowed the reader to take a little wine before starting in order to hold him over. The reader still fasts, in other words, but with help.

  If anything, this chapter on a now defunct practice is a lesson in the way that gentleness softens rigor without destroying either the practice or the person. Legalists too often opt for practice, whatever the cost to the people who are trying to do it; liberals too often opt for people’s convenience, whatever the loss of spiritual practice. Benedict opts for a way of life that cares for people physically while it goes on strengthening them spiritually.

  The contemporary question with which the chapter confronts us is an extremely powerful one: When we eliminate a spiritual discipline from our lives, because it is out of date or impossible to do anymore or too taxing to be valuable, what do we put in its place to provide the same meaning? Or do we just pare away and pare away whatever demands spiritual centering makes of us until all that is left is a dried-up humanism, at best?

  “Prayer without study is like a soul without a body,” the rabbis say. Benedict clearly felt the same. The purpose of reading at table was to prepare the monastic for prayer. It is necessary to understand the Scriptures before it is possible to pray them. It is essential to be steeped in the Scriptures before it is possible to exude them. Table reading, in other words, was not a way to get away from people; it was a way to get closer to God. It was also one of the few times in the monastic day, outside of prayer times, that the spiritually thirsty but hardworking Benedictine could spend concentrated time on the things of God.

  The point is that it isn’t so much the practice of reading at table that is important in this chapter; it is the idea of groundedness in the spiritual life that should make us stop and think. We’re all busy. We’re all overscheduled. We’re all trying to deal with people and projects that consume us. We’re all spiritually thirsty. And, we’re all responsible for filling the mind with rich ideas in order to leaven the soul. Prayer, contemplation, and spiritual adulthood don’t happen by themselves. We have to work at them. If mealtime isn’t a good time for study because the children or the family or the guest demand an attention then that no other time will provide, the question becomes, What periods do we set aside to become as comfortable with the ideas of God in life as we do the television schedule or the daily paper?

  Monastics will read and sing, not according to rank, but according to their ability to benefit their hearers.

  The proclamation of the Word is the sowing of the soul. It is not to be done idly. It is not to be done without artistry. The proclamation of the Word of God must become part of the process of experiencing God. Prima donnas who do it more for their own sake than for the sake of the assembly, who come to perform rather than to blend in with the tone and theme of the liturgy, do not enrich a service. They distract from it. On the other hand, the ungifted or the unprepared interrupt the flow of the prayer and call equally disturbing attention to themselves. Lectors, homilists, and musicians, liturgy teams and pastors and teachers, all have something to learn here that is just as important for our own time as it was for this one. Goodwill is no excuse for a lack of artistry. Authority is no substitute for education. The spiritual nourishment of an entire people is in our hands. We do not have the right to treat liturgy lightly. We do not have the right to reduce the sacraments to such rote in the name of tradition that their dryness leaves the people dry. We do not have the right to make performance a substitute for the participation of the praying community.

  CHAPTER 39

  THE PROPER AMOUNT OF FOOD

  March 18 – July 18 – Nov. 17

  For the daily meals, whether at noon or in midafternoon, it is enough, we believe, to provide all the tables with two kinds of cooked food because of individual weaknesses. In this way, the person who may not be able to eat one kind of food may partake of the other. Two kinds of cooked food, therefore, should suffice for all, and if fruit or fresh vegetables are available, a third dish may also be added. A generous pound of bread is enough for a day whether for only one meal or for both dinner and supper. In the latter case the cellarer will set aside one third of this pound and give it to the community at supper.

  Chapter 39 is on generosity and trust that flies in the face of a tradition of stern and demanding asceticisms. Benedict of Nursia never takes food away from the community. On the contrary, he assures himself that the fare will always be ample and will always be simple but pleasing. These were working monastics who needed energy to toil and peace to pray. Benedict decides that food is not to be the penance of their lives.

  Everybody needs something in life to make the rest of life doable and uplifting. The important thing in the spiritual life is that while we are creating penances for ourselves to build up our moral fiber we are also providing possibilities for ourselves to build up our spiritual joy.

  Should it happen that the
work is heavier than usual, the abbot and prioress may decide—and they will have the authority—to grant something additional, provided that it is appropriate, and that above all overindulgence is avoided, lest anyone experience indigestion. For nothing is so inconsistent with the life of any Christian as overindulgence. Our God says: “Take care that your hearts are not weighted down with overindulgence” (Luke 21:34).

  Exceptions. Exceptions. Exceptions. The Rule of Benedict is full of rules that are never kept, always shifting, forever being stretched. Only two Benedictine principles are implied to be without exception: kindness and self-control. The abbot is to make exceptions always; the monastic is never to take advantage of them or to lose control, to slip into dissipation, to fail to keep trying to keep the mind in charge of the body. Soft living, slouch-heartedness, a dried-up soul are not what give life meaning. It is stretching ourselves that keeps us supple and keeps us trim. We believe it about the body. We are inclined to overlook it in the soul. Let them have what they need, the Rule says, but let them forego what they don’t so that they can run through life with their bodies unburdened and their souls unsurfeited. It is good, clean living that Benedictine spirituality is about, living that keeps us young in heart and sharp of vision, living that has something for which to strive.

  The young should not receive the same amount as their elders, but less, since in all matters frugality is the rule. Let everyone, except the sick who are very weak, abstain entirely from eating the meat of four-footed animals.